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Yentl
: essential video:Barbra Streisand made her directorial debut with this 1983 adaptation of the Isaac Bashevis Singer story about a young Eastern European woman (Streisand) who disguises herself as a male at the turn of the century in order to get an education. Except for an excessive musical score with too many songs and Streisand's tiresome tendency to play characters who suppress their beauty, the film is crisp and engaging, and the gender-bending love story complications are fun, if gimmicky. Streisand gives a smart, vulnerable performance and gets fresh work from costars Mandy ...
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Squanto: A Warrior's Tale
:Description:Get ready for nonstop action in this rousing tale of a Native American who defies incredible odds in his struggle for freedom! Squanto, a young warrior abducted from his homeland and enslaved must battle impossible hazards on a desperate journey home. Driven by a passion to be free, he risks everything to escape his captors, braving the wilderness and triumphing, finally, as a great leader. A vivid true story of one man's unquenchable thirst for independence, SQUANTO thrills with high-powered action and inspires with legendary courage!
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Doctor
: :William Hurt is perfectly cast as an arrogant surgeon who treats patients like interchangeable cogs in the machinery of his medical practice. Then he is diagnosed with throat cancer and, as the title of the memoir on which it is based tells us, he gets a taste of his own medicine. The subplot involves the solidarity between doctors, which is shattered when the newly conscious physician discovers that one of his partners (Mandy Patinkin) is trying to cover up a case of malpractice. Hurt is solid, as is Wendy Crewson as the doctor ...
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The Princess Bride
: essential video:Screenwriter William Goldman's novel The Princess Bride earned its own loyal audience on the strength of its narrative voice and its gently satirical, hyperbolic spin on swashbuckled adventure that seemed almost purely literary. For all its derring-do and vivid over-the-top characters, the book's joy was dictated as much by the deadpan tone of its narrator and a winking acknowledgement of the clichés being sent up. Miraculously, director Rob Reiner and Goldman himself managed to visualize this romantic fable while keeping that external voice largely intact: using a storytelling framework, avuncular Grandpa ...
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Ragtime (1981)
: essential video:Fact and fiction intertwine in Milos Forman's colorful kaleidoscope of E.L. Doctorow's sprawling novel of turn-of-the-century America. Anchored in the true story of the murder of architect Stanford White (Norman Mailer) by Harry Thaw (Robert Joy) over the affections of his wife Evelyn Nesbit (Elizabeth McGovern), Forman weaves a portrait of early 1900s America in a tapestry of intertwining fictional tales. The primary thread involves the proud black pianist Coalhouse Walker Jr. (Howard Rollins) and his demand for justice when a racist fireman destroys his automobile, which escalates into a reign ...
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Maxie
: :After establishing her screen career with supporting roles in The Big Chill and The Natural, Glenn Close made her starring debut in the title role of this tepid comedy--an example of the 'body-switch' movie trend of the mid-1980s. No doubt Close sensed tour-de-force potential in playing a virtuous San Francisco wife and Catholic bishop's secretary whose body is possessed by the vampy spirit of a 1920s flapper. Instead, the movie drains all the energy from Close's valiant efforts, neglecting virtually any idea that might have made this film genuinely fresh and funny. What's ...
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Music of Chance
: :After establishing her screen career with supporting roles in The Big Chill and The Natural, Glenn Close made her starring debut in the title role of this tepid comedy--an example of the 'body-switch' movie trend of the mid-1980s. No doubt Close sensed tour-de-force potential in playing a virtuous San Francisco wife and Catholic bishop's secretary whose body is possessed by the vampy spirit of a 1920s flapper. Instead, the movie drains all the energy from Close's valiant efforts, neglecting virtually any idea that might have made this film genuinely fresh and funny. What's ...
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Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland (Clam)
: :Welcome to Grouchland, U.S.A., place of a thousand stenches. This is where everyone's favorite red monster winds up when he stars in his first feature film, The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland. Elmo learns a lesson when he refuses to share his blanket with his best friend, Zoe, then loses it in Oscar's can, where it goes all the way to Grouchland. There the beloved blanket winds up in the clutches of the greediest man alive, Huxley (played by Mandy Patinkin), and Elmo has to venture alone to Huxley's lair to get it ...
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Sunday in the Park With George
:Description:A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte by Georges Seurat is one of the great paintings of the world, and in 'Sunday in the Park with George,' book writer James Lapine and composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim bring a story based on the work brilliantly to life. While the painting depicts people gathered on an island in the Seine, the musical goes beyond simply describing their lives. It is an exploration of art, of love, of commitment. Seurat connected dots to create images; Lapine and Sondheim use connection as the heart of ...
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Men With Guns
: :It is impossible to predict where John Sayles will travel at any given time in his film career, but Men with Guns is one of the director's most surprising journeys. Shot in Spanish, with a little-known cast, the film is a beguiling mix of the political and the mythical. A well-heeled doctor (Argentine actor Federico Luppi) in an unnamed Latin country leaves his comfortable home, in search of former medical students who may be caught in the political violence of the countryside. Although Sayles casts an unflinching eye on the issues of poverty ...
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